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This week, Google is rolling out changes to its search engine that will “visibly affect” the rankings of “notorious” sites that enable the downloading or streaming of pirated music, movies, and TV shows. In the place of these unofficial or illegal links — which often rank above legal, commercial sites — Google will now show direct links to Amazon, Netflix, Spotify, and other “official” sites. Furthermore, Google will more aggressively prune the results that pop up via autocomplete so that they’re in-line with DMCA takedown notices (i.e. Google will no longer prompt you with “free download” when you start typing the name of a movie).

Almost since the advent of BitTorrent, Google has often been referred to as the best search engine for finding music, TV shows, movies, and whatever other pirated goods you might be after. It isn’t that Google intentionally set out to be a brilliant search engine for illegal downloads, it was just a simple matter of Google’s trawlers, indexers, and algorithms being very good at their job. The RIAA, BPI, MPAA, ESA and various other associations/lobbies have long criticized Google for not being more proactive in demoting these results from the first few pages — and it has only become a bigger issue as newer, easier-to-use methods, such as streaming and downloading from file lockers, surged in popularity over the last few years.

Google, suggesting I download Sons of Anarchy for free

Well, Google is finally going to do something about it. In a post on its Public Policy Blog, the company’s senior copyright counsel has outlined a number of new measures. First, sites that receive a lot of DMCA takedowns — i.e. letters sent by rightsholders to Google, asking for a page be removed from the index — will now be demoted. As a result, “the most notorious sites” will move further down the search results (though it isn’t yet clear how far they will go). Second, DMCA notices will affect the autocomplete terms that pop up when you’re searching for stuff — i.e. in some cases, Google will no longer suggest that you download stuff for free. (Again, there’s no word on how extensive this change will be.)

And finally, and perhaps most weirdly and aggressively, Google is creating a new ad box that appears when you search for “download”, “free,” “watch,” and other terms that suggest you might be looking to watch a TV show or movie without paying. This ad box will show links to Google Play, Amazon, Spotify, Hulu, or any other “official” site that has the TV show/movie/song in question. The catch: These companies will have to pay for the ad.

Google is also trialing a new right-hand panel with commercial/legal options, to curb piracy

Speaking to the BBC, the BPI — the British music lobby — was “broadly” happy with Google’s changes, but was amusingly indignant about rightsholders having to pay for top-of-the-bill listing. “There should be no cost when it comes to serving consumers with results for legal services.”

While it’s hard to be critical of Google’s anti-piracy measures, they do come across as a little heavy-handed. In general, if someone wants to pirate something, they’re going to pirate it, even if they have to click through a couple of pages of search results. As always, piracy is popular because some publishers and rightsholders make it really painful to easily and safely obtain your favorite TV show, movie, or game. There is a reason that easy-to-use services like Netflix, Spotify, and Steam are growing in popularity as their catalogs swell — most people do actually want to spend their money on things that they enjoy, and that they can afford.

Google’s new ad box will increase awareness that pay-for alternatives do exist, which is a good thing — I’m sure there are at least a few people who pirate stuff just because they don’t know that Amazon Prime is bundled with Amazon Instant Video — but let’s hope it stops there. Manipulating search results in favor of commercial interests isn’t a good thing, especially when it’s scaled up to affect more than just piracy.

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